By MEGAN JANETSKY and JULIA FRANKEL, Associated Press

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli police forcibly entered the compound of the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees in east Jerusalem early Monday, escalating a campaign against the organization that has been banned from operating on Israeli territory.

The U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees, or UNRWA, said in a statement that “sizable numbers” of Israeli forces, including police on motorcycles, trucks and forklifts, entered the compound in the Palestinian neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah.

“The unauthorized and forceful entry by Israeli security forces is an unacceptable violation of UNRWA’s privileges and immunities as a U.N. agency,” the statement said.

Meanwhile, officials said President Donald Trump will meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Dec. 29 as U.S. officials meet with Netanyahu to move ahead with a U.S.-brokered plan on the future of Gaza. It was not immediately clear where the leaders will meet.

Israel’s long campaign against UNRWA

The raid was the latest in Israel’s campaign against the agency, which provides aid and services to some 2.5 million Palestinian refugees in Gaza, the occupied West Bank and east Jerusalem, as well as 3 million more refugees in Syria, Jordan and Lebanon.

Photos taken by an Associated Press photographer show police erecting an Israeli flag on the compound, and police cars on the street. Photos provided by UNRWA staff show a group of Israeli police officers in the compound.

Police said in a statement they entered for a “debt-collection procedure” initiated by Jerusalem’s municipal government, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The agency was established to help the estimated 700,000 Palestinians who fled or were driven out of what is now Israel during the 1948 war surrounding the creation of the Israeli state. UNRWA supporters say Israel hopes to erase the Palestinian refugee issue by dismantling the agency. Israel says the refugees should be permanently resettled outside its borders.

For months following the start of the Israel-Hamas war began on Oct. 7, 2023, UNRWA was the main lifeline for Gaza’s population during Israel’s offensive there.

Throughout the war, Israel has accused the agency of being infiltrated by Hamas, using its facilities and taking aid — claims for which it has provided little evidence. The U.N. has denied it. Israel also has claimed that hundreds of Palestinian fighters work for UNRWA. UNRWA has denied knowingly aiding armed groups and says it acts quickly to purge any suspected fighters.

After months of attacks from Netanyahu and his far-right allies, Israel banned it from operating on its territory in January. The U.S., formerly the largest donor to UNRWA, halted funding to the agency in early 2024.

UNRWA has since struggled to continue its work in Gaza, with other U.N. agencies, including the World Food Program and UNICEF, stepping in. Tamara Alrifai, UNRWA’s director of external relations and communications, said UNRWA has been excluded from ceasefire talks.

“If you squeeze UNRWA out, what other agency can fill that void?” Alrifai said.

US officials meet Netanyahu

Netanyahu met with the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., Mike Waltz, and other officials on Monday in a visit the Trump administration said was aimed at pushing forward the U.S.-drafted 20-point plan for Gaza that includes the current ceasefire and following stages.

Israel’s government later said Trump and Netanyahu would meet on Dec. 29 to “discuss the future steps and phases and the international stabilization force of the ceasefire plan.”

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With the remains of one hostage in Gaza yet to be handed over to Israel, Arab and Western officials have said they expect an international governing body in Gaza to be announced in the coming weeks. A search was underway on Monday for the hostage’s remains, Hamas said.

On Sunday, a senior Hamas official told the AP the group is ready to discuss “freezing or storing or laying down” its arsenal of weapons as part of the ceasefire, offering a possible formula to resolve one of the thorniest issues in the U.S.-brokered agreement.

The war started when Hamas-led fighters attacked southern Israel, leaving around 1,200 people dead and abducting 251 others.

Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 70,360 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which operates under the Hamas-run government. The ministry does not differentiate between civilians and combatants, but says nearly half the dead have been women and children. The ministry’s numbers are considered reliable by the U.N. and other international bodies.

The ministry also says over 370 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli strikes since the ceasefire took effect.

Violence has also risen in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, where Israel’s military shot and killed one man Sunday night. Officials said he was throwing rocks at soldiers with two others, one of whom was arrested. Palestinian health officials said the third man was wounded. The military said no soldiers were injured.

Palestinian authorities identified the man killed as a 19-year-old from the northern city of Qalqilya.

Construction of barrier along Israel-Jordan border

Israel began construction of a 50-mile (80-kilometer) barrier along its border with Jordan, Israel’s defense minister said Monday.

Israel Katz said the construction was aimed at preventing “efforts of Iran and its proxies to establish an eastern front against the state of Israel.”

The final project will include increased security along 310 miles (500 kilometers) of border areas in eastern Israel, and would cost the government around $1.7 billion, according to Israeli government figures.

Associated Press writer Josef Federman in Doha, Qatar, contributed to this report.

By SAM McNEIL

BRUSSELS (AP) — European Union officials on Monday were finalizing a major overhaul of its migration system, including streamlined deportations and increased detentions, after years of fierce debate on the issue has seen the rise of far-right political parties.

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Since a surge in asylum-seekers and other migrants to Europe a decade ago, public views on the issue have shifted. EU migration policies have hardened, and the number of asylum-seekers is down from record levels. Still, U.S. President Donald Trump in recent days issued sharp criticism of the 27-nation bloc’s migration policies as part of a national security strategy painting European allies as weak.

Ministers meeting in Brussels agreed to a “safe third country” concept and a list of safe countries of origin, Danish minister Rasmus Stoklund said. That means EU nations can deny residency and deport migrants because they either hail from a safe country or could apply for asylum in one outside the EU.

“We will be able to reject people that have no reason for asylum in Europe, and then it will be possible for us to make mechanisms and procedures that enable us to return them faster,” Stoklund said. “It should not be human smugglers that control the access to Europe.”

Ministers also agreed to the formation of a “solidarity pool” to share costs of hosting refugees among member nations. The pool is meant to collect 430 million euros ($489 million) to disburse to countries facing greater migratory pressure including Cyprus, Greece, Italy and Spain in southern Europe. Hungary and Poland have long opposed any obligation for countries to host migrants or pay for their upkeep.

“It is important to give the people also the feeling back that we have control over what is happening,” said Magnus Brunner, the EU’s commissioner for migration.

The European Council will now negotiate with the 720 lawmakers at the European Parliament to accept or modify the migration policy changes. Right and far-right parties are largely unified in supporting the changes.

Amnesty International EU advocate on migration Olivia Sundberg Diez likened the EU’s migration changes to the Trump administration’s crackdown. She called on European lawmakers to block the new measures that “will inflict deep harm on migrants and the communities that welcome them.”

French Green lawmaker Mélissa Camara called the changes “a renunciation of our fundamental values and human rights.”

In May, EU nations endorsed sweeping reforms to the bloc’s asylum system, with the European Commission issuing the new Pact on Migration and Asylum. The pact, among other things, called for increasing deportations and setting up “ return hubs,” a euphemism for deportation centers for rejected asylum-seekers.

The EU wouldn’t set up or manage such “return hubs,” which could be in Europe or elsewhere, but would create the legal framework to allow states to negotiate with non-EU countries willing to take rejected asylum-seekers.

Nations like Austria and Denmark likely will seek partners to host such costly and legally murky centers, said Camille Le Coz, director of the Migration Policy Institute Europe think tank, pointing to the deal the Netherlands struck in September with Uganda to host refugees.

Such centers differ from the existing but so far ineffective deal signed by Italy with Albania to offshore the asylum processing of migrants rescued at sea. At the time, the contentious plan was applauded by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen as an “out-of-the-box” solution to manage irregular migration, but courts in Italy have repeatedly blocked it.

Mainstream political parties hope the pact on migration resolves the issues that have divided EU nations since well over 1 million migrants swept into Europe in 2015, most of them fleeing war in Syria and Iraq.

By MARK SHERMAN

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration’s push to expand control over independent federal agencies comes before a sympathetic Supreme Court that could overturn a 90-year-old decision limiting when presidents can fire board members.

Lawyers for the administration are defending President Donald Trump’s decision to fire Federal Trade Commission member Rebecca Slaughter without cause and calling on the court to jettison the unanimous 1935 decision in Humphrey’s Executor.

Arguments are taking place Monday.

The court’s six conservative justices already have signaled strong support for the administration’s position, over the objection of their three liberal colleagues, by allowing Slaughter and the board members of other agencies to be removed from their jobs even as their legal challenges continue.

Members of the National Labor Relations Board, the Merit Systems Protection Board and the Consumer Product Safety Commission also have been fired by Trump.

The only officials who have so far survived efforts to remove them are Lisa Cook, a Federal Reserve governor, and Shira Perlmutter, a copyright official with the Library of Congress. The court has suggested that it will view the Fed differently from other independent agencies, and Trump has said he wants her out because of allegations of mortgage fraud. Cook says she did nothing wrong.

A second question in the Slaughter case could affect Cook. Even if a firing turns out to be illegal, the court wants to decide whether judges have the power to reinstate someone.

Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote earlier this year that fired employees who win in court can likely get back pay, but not reinstatement.

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That might affect Cook’s ability to remain in her job. The justices have seemed wary about the economic uncertainty that might result if Trump can fire the leaders of the central bank. The court will hear separate arguments in January about whether Cook can remain in her job as her court challenge proceeds.

Chief Justice John Roberts has written a series of opinions dating back to 2010 that have steadily whittled away at laws restricting the president’s ability to fire people.

In 2020, Roberts wrote for the court that “the President’s removal power is the rule, not the exception” in a decision upholding Trump’s firing of the head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau despite job protections similar to those upheld in Humphrey’s case.

In the 2024 immunity decision that spared Trump from being prosecuted for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results, Roberts included the power to fire among the president’s “conclusive and preclusive” powers that Congress lacks the authority to restrict.

The court also was dealing with an FTC member who was fired, by President Franklin Roosevelt in 1935, who preferred his own choice at an agency that would have a lot to say about the New Deal.

William Humphrey refused Roosevelt’s request for his resignation. After Humphrey died the next year, the person charged with administering his estate, Humphrey’s executor, sued for back pay.

The justices unanimously upheld the law establishing the FTC and limiting the president to removing a commissioner only for “inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office.”

ZURICH (AP) — FIFA says it will include three-minute hydration breaks in each half of every game at next year’s World Cup, not just those played in hot weather.

The referee will stop the game 22 minutes into each half for players to take drinks, regardless of the temperature, the host country — the United States, Canada or Mexico — or whether the stadium has a roof and air conditioning.

The change may also be a hit with broadcasters, since it makes the game schedule more predictable. FIFA said it was first announced when the governing body’s chief tournament officer for the 2026 World Cup, Manolo Zubiria, attended a meeting with broadcasters.

He indicated that referees may have some flexibility if there’s a stoppage shortly before the 22-minute mark for an injury.

“This will be addressed on the spot with the referee,” Zubiria said.

FIFA said the move is a “streamlined and simplified version” of an earlier practice of having breaks after 30 minutes over a certain temperature threshold, once set at 32 degrees Celsius (89.6 Fahrenheit) on the wet bulb global temperature system.

The change comes after heat and humidity affected players during some games at this year’s Club World Cup in the U.S.

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At that tournament, FIFA reacted by lowering the threshold for cooling or water breaks and also placing more water and towels around the edge of the field.

Heat has long been an issue at major soccer tournaments. Amid concerns ahead of the 2014 World Cup, a Brazilian court ordered FIFA to make its recommended breaks mandatory or face fines.